


Epiphenomenon

by glacis



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-28
Updated: 2010-01-28
Packaged: 2017-10-06 18:44:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glacis/pseuds/glacis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lindsey makes a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Epiphenomenon

_Epiphenomenon, a Lindsey story. Concurrent with the episode 'Epiphany.'_

He didn't know what the hell she'd been trying to do with the gauntlet. Hadn't worked, whatever it was. Angel barged in, like he always did, fucked things up royally, nearly got Darla staked. Dusted a senior partner. Stole the ring. Put the kibosh on the seventy five year review.

Lindsey couldn't help but be a little thankful about the last.

A review right about now was the very last thing he needed. Well, maybe the second to last thing. Right behind a sudden reappearance of Angel. Okay, maybe a third. Right behind Darla acting independently. Not to mention crazily.

Incense stung his eyes, but he blinked them clear and intoned his chorus of the chant in appropriately somber Latin. Since Angel'd taken both the ring and the gauntlet with him in his plunge down the side of the building draped in the remains of the senior partner, they'd had to call an emergency Ritual. Couldn't let the idiot bastard make it to the Home Office. Especially not with a gauntlet Lindsey'd been key in bringing to the field of battle. He started to shiver.

Damn fool woman. She should've told him.

Glaring eyes brought him back to the present and he inserted the next three lines seamlessly into the tapestry of the spell. The incense smoldered. The chant continued. His temples ached and his phantom hand itched.

He really needed a drink.

They took a much-needed break after the Ritual. He ignored Lilah's killer stare and, instead of joining the herd at the bar, ducked into his office. Pulled out his cell. Punched the speed dial for his home number. Lifted it to his ear and listened to it ring twenty eight times. Very slowly he lowered the phone and flipped it shut.

Where the hell could she possibly be? It was the fourth time he'd tried to call her in the last five hours, and three of those hours he'd been in Circle chanting like a maddened monk. No answer. No hints. No goddamned idea what hair she'd got turned crosswise this time and where it had taken her. He was worried.

He was more than a little pissed.

It was getting harder and harder to remember that he loved her. Harder and harder to forget that she was, in the end, a tool. Of the Firm, of Special Projects, of himself. Harder and harder to think of her and not of Angel.

Hardest of all to be certain which one he wanted to kill, and which one he simply _wanted_.

Stuffing the phone in his pocket, ringer carefully turned to vibrate, he headed back into the meeting room. Time to salvage what, if anything, was left of his career. They might decide to rip his internal organs out and feed them to him tonight. Wouldn't be the first time personnel decisions had been made on the fly in reaction to an attack. Wouldn't even be the first time somebody'd died a bad unnatural death as the result. It'd just be the first time it was him.

Didn't bear thinking on.

Blanking his mind as best he could, Lindsey put on his professional, damned good, poker face and went out to meet his fate.

Lilah had a triumphant look on her narrow face. Lindsey ignored her. Mr. Hart stared at him. He went over to stand beside the apparently-human representative of the senior partners.

"How much did you know, Lindsey?"

Arctic question. He could feel his skin goosebump. "Nothing, sir," he answered. God's honest truth, closer than he'd come to it in a long time, anyway. A rippling sensation cascaded through his brain, and the shiver intensified to a shudder. Mind readers. Hart looked away then looked back. The ice didn't thaw, but at least it was no longer an active weapon aimed at him. Lindsey didn't bother looking innocent or sincere. He could do either, and do them well, but there was no point. They were all lawyers. They each knew all the tricks. Hart nodded shortly.

Lilah looked disappointed. Lindsey didn't smile, outside or inside. It was too serious. Too close to the edge. He could've ended up dead here tonight. Messily dead. Because of Darla. Because of Angel, yeah, but he was used to that. This time, it was because of Darla.

He hadn't realized he was still capable of feeling betrayed. It felt strange. Unsettling. He'd let her in too far. Had from the moment he'd fought so hard to resurrect her. Since he'd done everything he had to do to keep her from dying. Since he'd realized he couldn't have her. Just like Angel.

There was still a tiny flicker of hope there. He hadn't realized until that moment that he was so damned stupid.

Shaking off thoughts of his own failure, knowing it was a bad idea to bleed visibly in the middle of a shark tank, Lindsey forced himself to concentrate on the moment. Get through the next few hours. Make it home before he started to crack. Lick his wounds in private.

Find out where the hell Darla had got herself to. Stop her. Help her. Kill her. Love her. Something. He didn't know what.

He hoped he would when the time came. Helluva good thing he was so good at improvising.

It was still dark when he got home. On the far horizon of his exhaustion it surprised him. It felt like it had been days, not hours, since the fiasco of the Manifestation.

Fiasco. Wolfram and Hart. Angel. A progression of terms that kept repeating again and again. He'd really like to stake the son of a bitch. Smiling over the thought, he leaned against the side of the elevator and took a deep breath. The smile faded.

Maybe not.

Maybe.

Hell, he didn't know. Didn't know anything lately. Had no goddamned clue what was going through Darla's head. No idea, as always, what Angel was up to and where it was headed. No way of knowing what tomorrow would bring, although he'd made it through the disaster that night by sheer bravado and actual lack of direct wrong-doing. They'd figure out soon enough that Darla was with him. Hopefully not before the kill order was revoked.

Tomorrow's business.

His key scrabbled at the door for a second before he was able to get it into the lock. There were times when he missed his right hand more than others. He was always aware of the lack, but when he was tired his clumsiness overwhelmed him. He felt out of balance. Inept. Ineffectual.

Not a feeling he enjoyed. Helplessness sucked. He'd had too much vulnerability too often in his life. He didn't deal well with powerlessness.

So the wave of weakness that rode through him when he saw her standing at the window only served to make him mad. He fought both reactions, striving to keep his voice calm.

"Darla." She kept staring out over the lit skyline that defined LA. The city that never turned its lights off, even in the middle of a power shortage. Conspicuous consumption personified in a place. He took a deep breath and moved into the room, kicking the door shut gently behind him.

"I've been calling here all night. Why haven't you answered?" She didn't answer him in person either. Didn't even look at him. He reached past her and closed the curtains. "Get away from the window. It's not safe." He couldn't quite keep the harshness from his voice. Was she trying to die? Was that it?

Forcing a moderate tone, stepping behind her, he breathed in deeply. She smelled of musk and shampoo. Freshly showered. "They called an emergency meeting tonight." He explained why it had taken so long to get home, although she hadn't asked. "After what happened, the official order on you is to stake on sight." He ran the tips of the fingers on his prosthetic hand from her shoulder to her elbow. He couldn't feel the softness of her skin, but he could feel the pressure where they touched. A barrier between them, sensations gathered second-hand. The story of their relationship.

She walked away. The rest of the story of their relationship.

"You should have told me what you had planned." A sudden burst of anger shot through him and he used its energy, walking over and twitching more curtains closed, his movements sharp and precise. "I would've talked you out of it. Helped you. I don't know." He honestly didn't. Giving up on staying away from her, he turned and walked back to her, staring down at her averted face. "Things are getting complicated for us now." As if it had been a cakewalk before.

"Yes." She finally spoke, but she still sounded very far away. It unnerved him. "Yes, I believe they are."

Not sure how to bridge the distance between them, he busied himself with details. How to keep her safe. For as long as possible. "We should probably clear your stuff out of here. Move it into my bedroom. I just think it's best for us …" His voice petered out. Us? What us? There wasn't any us. He bit down the thought and asked with all the tenderness he could muster, "Darla, what's wrong?"

She didn't answer. Again. Sat there in the chair, a million miles away, and played with a bauble, slipping it between her fingers. His gaze sharpened.

"What is this?" He reached for it. She didn't stop him. His breath stopped in his throat when he recognized the ring he'd first seen on the senior partner's hand, and last seen going through a fifteenth floor window along with the remains of that senior partner and Angel. "Where did you get this?"

"What's the difference? It doesn't work anyway." She sounded bored. He couldn't keep the fury out of his response.

"No, of course it doesn't work, because after _Angel_ stole it there was a disenchanting ceremony. It took half the meeting. How did you _get_ this?" His voice broke a little, gravel spilling out. There was that betrayal again. He knew the answer before he asked the question, but he had to hear her say it.

"It was my payment."

Bile rose up, made his chest hurt, made his mouth sour. He swallowed hard. "Your payment. What are you talkin' about?" He heard the drawl crawling through the cracks in his composure, but there wasn't a damned thing he could do about it.

"What do you _think_ I'm talking about, Lindsey?" Touch of sarcasm, enough dismissal to burn like fire, the sophisticate talking down to the redneck. He barely stopped himself from screaming at her, and the muted yell that escaped finally brought her attention directly to him.

"I don't know!"

She stared at him, seeming to see him for the first time since he'd walked in the door. He stared back, unsure what he was trying to tell her, even less sure what he wanted to hear. Only knowing that he had to hear it. Had to know. The intensity choked him. He glanced away, fighting to keep from screaming again, fighting to stop himself from throwing the fucking ring in her face, fighting not to break down and cry and completely humiliate himself. Forcing himself away from the brink, he looked over at her.

"What happened?" His voice sounded like broken glass.

"Nothing. Nothing happened." She looked like she really meant it, and it was tearing her up inside. "My god, nothing at all."

"Darla." He hated to beg but he couldn't stop himself. "Tell me. I have to know."

"You want details, Lindsey?" Now she sounded amused. Scornful and amused. "Is that what you want?"

"Yes," he snarled back at her. Her eyes widened. "I want details. I need to know everything. All of it." He glared at her. Her face abruptly drained of expression, and for the first time since he'd known her, he could see all four hundred years of experience showing in her eyes. "What'd he do to you?"

There was a very long silence. He refused to yield. She refused to answer. After what felt like forever, she answered with cold precision, "Nothing I didn't want him to do."

He took a deep breath. Let it out slowly. Eventually she looked away from him, staring back into the distance, shutting him out. Quietly she added, "It was perfect. Absolutely perfect."

Lindsey froze. Did she mean what he thought she meant? If that was the case, then had Angelus returned? And why was she here, if so? If not … his brain was spinning. He had to _know_.

"Perfect." He'd never heard so much desolation in a single word.

Eventually he got tired of standing, and moved over to sit beside her on the sofa. She folded in on herself, keeping to the edge, wedged against the arm cushions, looking away from him. He waited. She sat. He fidgeted. She didn't.

He prided himself on his patience, but she could out-wait the end of time. She'd made up her mind that he'd gotten all he was going to get out of her, and there wasn't a damned thing he could do about it.

Not that he'd gotten anything from her.

Ever.

Rage that had been building for hours suddenly exploded in him. His tie was strangling him. His suit was suffocating him. He had to find answers, and if Darla wouldn't talk, Angel sure as hell would. Even if Lindsey had to beat them out of him. Maybe _'specially_ if Lindsey had to beat 'em out of him. Lindsey the lawyer hadn't had any luck at all with Angel.

Lindsey the sharecropper's boy _would_.

It had been a long while since he'd been hunting. The boots were perfect to kick the shit out of Angel. The jeans and sheepskin jacket fit like his own skin, in a way the Armani never did, no matter how much tailoring he had done. This was Lindsey at his core, the core of red-hot fury that had sustained him through the long winters that had killed first his mother, then his sister, then his little brother. It had fueled his rise to a place where he'd never have to stand in the wind and the cold while some bastard from a bank took every single thing he owned, like had happened to his Daddy. He'd learned his lessons young and learned them hard. He'd thought he'd left what he'd been behind him. It would have shocked him to discover how close to the surface the past still lived, if he'd stopped to think about it.

Didn't matter. He was on auto-pilot. Thinking didn't factor into his actions at all.

He peered intently through the windshield of his three-quarter ton Ford at the new offices of Angel Investigations. He'd seen his prey go in earlier with Wesley, still in a wheelchair from his latest wounds. Shortly afterward Gunn had joined them. Very shortly after that all three had come out, climbed into Angel's convertible and headed off toward Brentwood.

Lindsey was just out of eyeball range behind them.

He didn't want Gunn or Wes. Didn't give a shit about 'em. Wanted them out of the way. Wanted everybody out of the way but Angel. Shit was gonna be stomped and he was gonna be the one doin' the stomping. Fate, in the form of a tribe of three-eyed demons, stepped in. Gunn and Wes drove away. He stepped on the gas.

The demons scattered.

Angel stood there. Silhouetted perfectly by the streetlight. Standing in the middle of the street. Perfect, all right. Perfect target.

He made a real satisfying thump as he hit the hood and went under the body of the truck. Missed the tires, though. Damn. Better luck on the next pass.

Lindsey was barely aware that he was growling as he rammed the truck into reverse with his plastic hand and backed over Angel's sprawled body. Vampiric reflexes kicked in and Angel managed to get out of the way of the tires again. Frustration bubbled through Lindsey. He wanted blood. Mangled, crushed and severed limbs. Incredible pain. All the things Angel had visited on Lindsey, with answers thrown in for good measure. And he wanted them all _now_.

By the fourth time he ran over the undead son of a bitch and still couldn't get the cold body under his tires, Lindsey's patience, stretched to breaking point already, thinned to nothing. Punching the truck into a tight three-sixty, he penned Angel in the middle of the street, running him in circles, trying to run him into the ground so Lindsey could literally run him into the pavement. Even that didn't work, because Angel slipped the trap and headed for the side of the road. Lindsey clipped him with the edge of his bumper and knocked him on his belly in the middle of the street.

Pulling to a stop, breathing hard and sweating harder, Lindsey jumped lightly from the truck and reached into the bed for the sledgehammer he'd tossed in before leaving the garage. This was gonna hurt. And how. Even better, Angel was gonna talk. He swung the hammer like a baseball bat, long-unused skills coming back to him as he brought the weapon down in a graceful arc directly between Angel's shoulder blades.

"You're gon' tell me everything!" He could feel a snarl on his face that could almost pass for a smile. His accent was thicker in his ears than he could remember in decades. He felt freer than he had since as far back as he could remember. The solid thud of the hammer recoiled through his shoulder and back as he brought it down on Angel's body again. "Everythin' you did with her." Another solid thwack. Angel grunted. "All of it." To the spine, to the belly, to the jaw. "You're gonna tell me."

Angel looked up at him, too goddamned cool and collected for a guy who was getting the shit whaled out of him with a sledgehammer by a terminally-pissed off farm boy. "Why?"

What a stupid question. Lindsey nearly growled, "'Cuz I wanna hear it from you!" She wouldn't tell me. You will. I couldn't hurt her like she hurt me. I can hurt you and I will. The hammer slammed into Angel's belly again and it was a tough pull to haul it back out again. "Tell me." An order. A demand. A plea. Another blow with the hammer. "Tell me!" Harder now, the hardest Lindsey'd hit him so far. Mortal man'd be dead by this time, but Angel was neither. Lindsey wasn't sure Angel'd been a mortal man even when he'd been alive. "**_Tell me_**!" The scream broke through his clenched teeth.

"No," Angel told him calmly.

The sledgehammer made a complete circle in the air, gathering momentum in a roundhouse swing before connecting with Angel's jaw. His skull made a satisfying crunching sound as it hit the pavement. Lindsey glared down at him for a second, seeing no movement. It was enough.

He'd had enough.

Nothing from Darla. Nothing from Angel. Nothing left.

Reaching into the bed of his truck again, his fingers closed around the rough surface of a stake. It was time for it to end. It had to end, because he couldn't take any more of it. Before he could bring the stake up and go back to Angel to finish it, he felt something at his shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Lindsey."

He had just enough time to think, 'Shit!' and to realize Angel actually did sound sorry, before a ton of bricks slammed into the side of his face and he reeled. Lindsey hit the side of the truck and slid toward the street.

"I really am."

Inhumanly strong hands grabbed hold of his jacket and yanked him around. He barely registered the cold of the night air against his shoulders as his jacket was pulled nearly off him, then another lead fist smacked him back down.

"I'm sorry she'll never" a knee caught him in the belly, bending him over and taking his breath, "love you. I'm sorry you're going to have to" another punch caught him across the cheek, "live with that. I'm sorry I didn't try harder to help you," the world swung crazily, pain exploding in his head and along his back as he bounced face-first into the side of his truck again, "when you came to me. I'm sorry you made the wrong choice."

The next punch landed Lindsey flat on his back. He didn't have the wind to say anything, but he still had some fight left. Inching along the pavement with his false hand, he tried to grab hold of the stake. Had to kill him. Couldn't lose again. Before he could reach it, the sledgehammer came out of nowhere. The shock of the hard plastic of his hand being pulverized jolted through the cup against the stump, wrenched the straps, sent shock waves into his shoulder and clear down his spine. He stared in rapt disbelief at the yellow shards littering the street.

"Coulda been the other one." For a second, he could hear Angelus in Angel's voice. That fucking Irish lilt. "Just be glad I had an epiphany."

God damn him to hell. Lindsey stared, feeling his stomach drop, feeling every ache in every muscle, and knowing for the last time he was a loser. Out-matched, beaten down, not a snowball's chance in hell of winning. Ever. From far away Lindsey heard Angel say, "Mind if I borrow your --" and turned to look at him just in time to have a foot connect with his jaw.

" -- truck?" sounded in his aching head as everything went dark. It was a relief.

He didn't know how long he was out, but it was dawn when he pulled himself off the sidewalk and began the long walk home. He had money, could call a cab, didn't bother. He knew he looked like shit. Knew no cabbie'd pick him up, and didn't want to call the Firm for a driver. This had been personal. Still was. A personal quest, a personal failure.

At the first dumpster he'd found, he unstrapped the remnants of his prosthetic and tossed it in the trash. His stump was sore, scored red and bleeding in spots from the pounding it had taken when Angel'd smashed the hand. The air hurt against it. Too cold. Like everything else about him except the blood dripping down his face.

His boot heels echoed on the sidewalk. He knew he had a ferocious scowl on his face but there wasn't a damned thing he could do about it. Angel had taken everything that Darla had left. Even Darla hadn't managed to break him so completely, but Angel had reduced him to his component parts, then managed to shatter those parts as thoroughly as he'd shattered that plastic hand. He slowed as he neared his apartment building, then walked slowly forward.

Parked neatly exactly three inches from the edge of the curb was his truck. He looked it over quickly. Looked like somebody'd used it for a battering ram. A headlight was crushed. Fender was bashed in. Grill was busted. So was the windshield.

For some reason, seeing his truck in such a sorry state hurt worse than his own injuries.

There was a piece of paper stuck to a jagged point of broken glass. He reached forward and plucked it off. Unfolding it, he stared uncomprehendingly at the single word written across it.

"Thanks."

Thanks. Great. Bastard beats the holy hell out of Lindsey, takes away his manhood, leaves him with not a fucking thing … then thanks him for the use of his truck. Lindsey shook his head. Made no sense. None of it made any sense at all.

He was practically comatose with exhaustion by the time he made it to his front door. The lock was a pain in the ass, as always, but he eventually fumbled it open and stumbled inside.

It echoed.

He knew before he asked, but he had to try. "Darla?"

That echoed, too.

He tightened his jaw and looked around the room. It had been cleaned out, anything of value, little of it his own, stripped and gone with her. He walked wearily over to the closet and opened the door.

Empty hangers. Like the empty apartment. Empty like he was.

His fingers clenched around the neck of two of the hangers. There'd been silk hanging from them the night before. Red, on one, black on the other. Edged with lace. Smelled like musk, felt like heaven. A lot like Darla, not that he'd gotten a real chance to find out.

Lindsey slouched on the sofa and watched the sun rise through the curtains. Closed out, left behind, barely seen and hardly known. He didn't know who he was anymore. Didn’t know if he had a choice left in the maze his life had become, or if he did, what it might be. Didn't have much of anything left inside him. It had all dried up, waiting for words from Darla that never came, or been shaken out by Angel.

He'd felt dirty for years. Cold for even longer. Now he felt empty, too.

He didn't know when he fell asleep, but it was early evening when he woke up. He was so stiff he could barely move, and his jaw hurt from clenching his teeth even in his sleep. Stripping off nearly killed him. Forty minutes under the shower loosened his muscles up enough to be able to bend over and put his boots back on.

His first stop probably should have been the Firm. God, or Somebody, only knew how much ass-covering he had waiting for him there. But he found himself at the mechanic's garage instead, nodding over repair bills, staring up at cracked axles and pointing out dents and broken glass. He had them write up a second copy of the bill, then climbed into the company Jag he normally used and headed out toward mid-town. He was actually standing on the sidewalk in front of Angel Investigations with the bill in his hand before he knew what he was going to do. He shrugged, winced as the movement jarred bruised bones, and stalked into the office.

Peripherally he was aware of Gunn standing protectively over Wesley, and of the abortive move the injured man made toward his cane. There was a depth of affection between the two that gave him pause before he shrugged them off as unimportant. Detouring around Cordelia, gawking at him from the desk, he made a beeline for Angel, hovering awkwardly off to the side of the group.

As he stretched out the piece of paper toward Angel, Cordelia asked sarcastically, "What truck hit you?" He didn't bother answering. Not surprisingly, Angel answered for him.

"That would be me," he said whimsically. "That the truck hit."

"What can we do for you?" Wesley asked coldly, trying for authority. Lindsey ignored him, too.

"You gonna be epiphanyin' any time now, since we got us a lawyer in the house?" The nonsensical question came from Gunn but appeared to be aimed at Angel. Angel opened his mouth to answer him and Lindsey stuck the bill in front of his nose. He was standing so close to the vampire he could feel the chill rising from his skin.

"You're welcome," he growled, referring to the insulting note of thanks Angel'd left pinned to his shattered windshield. "Here's the bill for the repairs." As always when he was in a pure temper, his drawl was a foot thick.

"Is that Lindsey or his country cousin?" Cordelia asked rhetorically. Angel poked at the bill with one finger, peering around it at her over Lindsey's head.

"I think this is Lindsey with the gloss knocked off." The whimsical note was still there full-force. Lindsey felt a fierce longing for a nice, sharp stake.

"That was _your_ vehicle?" Wesley sounded like he was in shock.

"Made one hell of a battering ram, gotta give ya that," Gunn chimed in.

Angel looked at Lindsey. Lindsey glared back. "Is this payback for Darla?" he asked mildly, taking the paper in hand and glancing down at the total. Lindsey hadn't spared him a dime of the mechanics' greed.

As he'd been doing since he'd pushed Darla from a room full of vengeful colleagues, Lindsey reacted without thinking. One of these days, probably real damn soon, it was going to get him killed. He wrapped his one real hand around the back of Angel's neck, yanked his face down within striking distance and kissed him.

Hard.

Since Angel'd been revving up for another smartass remark, Lindsey caught him gaping like a fish. Made it easy for his tongue. It was a sneak-attack kiss, as thorough and devastating as any he'd ever planted. It took Angel as much by surprise as Lindsey, and his response was as raw and honest as any in his very long life.

Dimly, he heard splutters from Wesley, a hoot from Gunn, and a shocked shrill warning from Cordelia. "You better not be thinking of sleeping with Angel because we like him just as he is -- well, for the most part -- and we don't want him turning all evil just because he has sex. I have a chain and a stake right here if you get any funny ideas! Either of you!"

Lindsey broke the kiss and Angel stared down at him, looking a little dazed. "Too late for that," he admitted.

"Thank you for answerin' my question," Lindsey told Angel in return, then bunched up his fist and hit him as hard as he could on the jaw. The impact of vampire skull to plaster wall left a hole. Angel slid down to the floor in an unconscious heap as Lindsey turned on his boot heel and stalked back out the door. Gunn leapt instinctively to defend Wesley, but Lindsey ignored both of them as he had for the entire encounter and stomped out to the Jag.

He could feel them staring after him in shock as he drove away. The feeling followed him all the way down the block. It helped distract him from the burning in his knuckles and the tingling in his mouth. A little. Not enough. Not nearly.

His brain was spinning in dizzying circles all the way back to his apartment. Lindsey MacDonald had gotten to be a junior partner in Wolfram and Hart by lying, cheating, killing and conjuring, but he'd never lied to himself. He knew why he'd kissed Angel. He just didn't want to believe it. Because to believe it, he'd have to admit that he was sorry, too, that Angel hadn't tried a little harder to save Lindsey when he'd come seeking help for those children. Not because of Angel's redemption, or the children's lives, or even the tattered remnants of his own soul.

And if he admitted how he felt about Angel, even to himself, he'd have to admit how far he'd fallen, and how impossible the climb back out would be. And he wasn't quite ready to admit defeat. He'd faced tough odds before. He could do it again. He simply had to figure out how he wanted to play the hand first.

Wouldn't do to win the game only to find out he was playing for the wrong stakes.

Pulling up outside his apartment building, he wasn't as surprised as he should have been to see Kiulam demons in human guise waiting to escort him back to the Firm. Four of them. He was impressed. They must really have thought he'd been going to run. The thought was amusing. Where the hell did he have to run **to**?

"Mind if I get cleaned up first?" he asked. A rhetorical question as it turned out. The answer was nonverbal, short and to the point. He straightened his jacket and made himself comfortable on the leather back seat of the Benz into which he'd been stuffed. As comfortable as he could get, bookended by six hundred pounds of guard demon.

No one looked at him as he was escorted through the underground parking garage, into the executives' entrance and up the express elevator. Might have been because nobody could see him, with his phalanx of Kiulam. Might've been 'cause they weren't looking. Firm employees learned early what to note and what to turn a blind eye to if they wanted to survive. He used to be good at that. Then he'd discovered that his blind eye had, well, a blind spot. He'd been up to his ears in shit since _that_ happened.

Lindsey had never been to the top floor of the Firm before. He'd been up to the eighteenth, once. His own office was on the twelfth. Only one elevator went all the way up to the twenty sixth. It was a small elevator. Pressed in on all sides by Kiulam he broke into a sweat. It was hot.

That's what he told himself. It wasn't completely a lie. It just wasn't the whole truth.

That whole truth hit him as soon as the lead Kiulam opened the single door opposite the elevator and shoved him through it. The door had looked nondescript. Like any other door to any other conference room in the building. If one didn't look too closely and recognize that the grain in the wood wasn't blood-colored. It _was_ blood.

The sweat on his skin turned to ice as the door shut behind him. He was alone in the room, except for a single figure standing where the window should be, if there'd been a window. Instead, there were curtains, and what looked like the open maw of a furnace. A fire that big should have warmed the whole room, but Lindsey couldn't feel any heat. Just a cold wind that bit at him, made his bruises and cuts ache instantly, sent little bolts of agony up from the scars at the end of his stump.

The figure turned and smiled at him, eyes twinkling as they had in life, usually right before ordering someone's death. Lindsey gaped in spite of himself. Then he winced. His self-control was shot to hell.

"Holland! But you're … well, of course you are. Sorry. Didn't mean to be so stupid." At least his accent was firmly stamped out of his voice. Mortal terror was the one deep emotion that _didn't_ send him back to his roots. He tried to avoid staring at the livid bite marks on the side of Holland's neck. Darla'd been a messy eater.

His late mentor strolled up to him and reached out to touch a gentle finger to the livid bruises around his eye. "It would appear that stupidity has become more the norm than the exception for you lately, Lindsey." The twinkle muted and solemnity shadowed Holland's expression. "I'm disappointed in you. I had very high hopes for you, Lindsey." Sincerity drenched the words. "What happened? Can you tell me?" A small, well-calculated pause, then in a lower tone, inviting confidence, "Do you even know, yourself, what happened?"

Death hadn't tarnished the man's mastery. He'd been a persuasive interrogator in life, and was equally as effective in death. Lindsey swallowed, trying to figure out how to answer the unanswerable. Before he could figure out a graceful way to accept his no-doubt truly unpleasant fate, the walls started to whisper.

Inside his head.

All around him.

In his bones.

Voices of judgment, voices of condemnation, voices of damnation. Insidious and insane laughter barely lower than hearing range, grating on his nerves. The blood on the door seeped through the woodwork into the room and began to run down in long strands of sticky fluid, tears wept by the very walls, as the fabric of reality began to tear around him.

He only knew he'd been screaming when he stopped. He was on his knees, Holland's hand resting atop his head, patting his hair gently, crooning softly. It reminded Lindsey irresistibly of his childhood, when he was four or five, and all the kids were still living, and Daddy would pull up the blankets and touch each head, making sure all his little angels were in place, while Momma sang to the baby and made them forget that they were going to bed hungry again. With all the pain he was feeling, he also felt peace, a peace he hadn't known since Momma'd died and Daddy'd lost everything and the children started dying.

His face was buried against Holland's pant-leg and he was crying, but he didn't care about that, either. He'd felt the voices in his head, pulling out every hidden motivation, even the ones he'd hidden from himself. He'd seen what they'd seen, heard what they'd decided, and he knew it was the end. But there were things he had to know, too, answers he had to have before they put him in the oblivion they promised him.

Or the hell. By this point he didn't much care either way.

Pulling back enough to be able to look up into the false compassion in Holland's eyes, Lindsey asked roughly, "Was this all part of the plan? Angel, and Darla? To destroy me along the way? Did it work?" He coughed, feeling mucous running down his throat from clogged sinuses, bringing up his hand to dash at the tears blurring his vision. "Was it worth it?"

"Oh, Lindsey."

Holland sounded affectionate. He always had. For a second Lindsey wondered if any of that affection had been real, then cast that thought aside as worthless, as well. It didn't matter. Not anymore. Maybe not ever.

"You failed with Angel, you failed with Darla, and you failed the Firm. The failures are completely unrelated. You would have failed regardless of your intent, because Darla would never love you, and Angel would never hate you. They are creatures beyond your ken, and ever would be."

"You set me up." Lindsey rocked back on his heels and stared up at Holland. The smile on the old man's face was surprisingly gentle.

"Oh, no, Lindsey." He shook his head. "We didn't have to. You failed all on your own. You tried, and you failed, because it isn't in you to be what we need. And it isn't in you to be what Angel or Darla want. You're not dark enough for her; you're not strong enough for us; you're not good enough for him. You are, in the end, simply inadequate on all fronts."

The voices rose up around him, drowning out any response he might have made. The world narrowed to two ancient blue eyes, devoid of warmth or understanding, an avidity to them that made his own blood cry in sympathy with the voices swirling in the void around him. Words pounded at him through the cacophony. Hopeless. Lost. Useless. Failure. Not enough. Never enough. Desolation swept through him, emptying him of everything, even the bitterness that had been the center of his ambition since his childhood. Without that drive, without the hatred, without even the need for vengeance, he was left with nothing.

There was a metallic taste along his tongue. His hand was shaking. His face was wet, and he could taste the salt along his lower lip where the tears were running into his mouth. The voices were a muted chorus in the back of his mind. His shoulder was cramping.

He opened his eyes to find himself in his own office. Alone. No Holland, no guards, no nightmares. Just himself and a gun. With the barrel in his mouth and his index finger on the trigger. Which was cocked.

He couldn't, to save his soul, think of a single reason not to pull the trigger.

Muscles were moving in reaction to the thought when his stump began to itch. Fiercely. The hum of the voices giving him so many reasons to use the gun, not the least of which being to shut them the hell up, was suddenly overwhelmed by a single cheerful voice. It had a distinctly Irish brogue.

"Ye've got a choice, ya know, ya numskull. Not that it'd be too numb with the most of it blown to smithereens."

Choice? His finger relaxed and he closed his eyes again, caught by the impossibility of this new voice. Beneath it, he heard another echo. "There's always a choice." Angel.

Damned Angel.

His finger quivered, and the Irish voice barked at him. "Yeah, a choice! Yours. Death or life. Continuance or radical departure, man. Hell as ye've never imagined the like, or rebirth, of a sort." The voice paused, and when it continued it was very soft. "Think hard on it, Lindsey. Oblivion in the service of those ye're doomed to fail … or Angel. It's a right pain either way, but one could be a wee bit easier to take than t'other. At least the pain in the arse ain't mortal."

The double meaning in the last sentence made him smile in spite of himself. "Been in pain my whole damn life," he said aloud, not caring who heard. "I'm used to it." He didn't know when he'd laid the gun on his desk and uncocked the trigger.

The laughter he heard this time didn't taunt him. For reasons he couldn't explain, it warmed him. With the realization that he wasn't shivering came a brightening of the room, until he had to squint against the brightness filling his vision.

"Why?" he asked suddenly. "Why'm I given a choice? Why didn't they just kill me?" Like they do with the rest of their failures? Even though he didn't say the words aloud, he had the impression the new voice had heard him.

There was sadness as well as understanding in the response he got. "Only the innocent and the guilty are given no choice in their fate, man. Those who're both must choose their own path. Sort of neutral territory in the war between Good and Evil, as it were. Don't bollix it up like I did. So make up your mind, boyo. We're runnin' out of time."

Lindsey didn't consciously make any decisions. His instincts took over, something deeper and more integral to his being than any conscious thought could ever be. His mind supplied an image of Angel, and he turned toward it. The light responded by exploding all around him, and he threw up his right arm to shade his eyes as the world went agonizingly white. It gathered into a lightning bolt that struck him, knocking him off his feet. His last coherent thoughts were that his arm was on fire, and a single mental cry of 'sonofabitch!', then there was nothing.

He didn't know he'd been asleep until he woke up. His cheek caught against the pillowcase, and he raised a hand to rub the stubble there, covering a yawn automatically. His other hand ran down from where it had been resting on his chest, subconsciously registering the nubbly feel of a sweatshirt, then on to the yielding denim of jeans worn nearly white. His fingertips enjoyed the softness of the cotton against them. His bare toes curled into the sheets beneath them, and he yawned again. He didn't recognize the room he was in. Had never seen it before in his life. For some reason it didn't bother him. He felt oddly safe. A stray thought struck him and he froze.

Mid-yawn, his eyes popped open, mouth gaped wide. The hand he'd used to cover his mouth raised by degrees until it was directly in front of his staring eyes.

His right hand.

That wasn't plastic.

A strange noise escaped his throat, a hybrid of a gargle and a gasp. He closed his jaw slowly, as if it was rusty, and swallowed. Twice. Blinked. Three times.

The hand remained.

He licked his lips and swallowed again, trying to moisten a mouth that had gone dry when he'd seen the impossible dangling right in front of his face. He looked closer and verified that yes, indeed, he did have his hand back. Around the wrist where, before the strange events of the day, he'd had a mass of scars and a strapped-on plastic hand, there was a thin blue tattoo that looked like fine barbed wire, and a real, live, human hand. That worked.

He curled his fingers into a fist. Spread them out. Flexed his hand a couple times. Snapped his fingers.

Yup. Worked.

He was only distracted from staring at his amazing new working hand when the door to the room opened up and Angel walked in. Dropped the book he was carrying and stared at Lindsey with as much astonishment as Lindsey was staring at him.

"What are you doing here?" Angel eventually asked.

Lindsey thought it over for half a second, considering and rejecting every response from 'Where’s here?' to 'Charging by the hour,' and told him the truth. "Starting over."

Angel continued to stand in the doorway, apparently unable to decide what to do about this unexpected development. Lindsey rolled out of the bed and walked over to stand in front of him. Angel braced for an attack. Lindsey held up his brand-new hand. "What do you think it means?"

Dark eyes stared at the hand for a long moment before looking back at his face. "Beats me," Angel answered just as honestly.

"Okay." Sounded like a plan to Lindsey. He bunched his new fingers into a fist and took a swing.

Angel caught him. No surprise. Yanked him up close against him. Not much of a surprise. Kissed him.

Hell of a surprise.

Or perhaps not so much of one, after all. The fist unclenched and both hands got to work stripping Angel off as they moved toward the bed. Inhumanly strong hands caught hold of him by the waist, lifting him up as if he weighed nothing and tossing him right back on the bed he'd just left. Then they were stripping his clothes off even faster than his hands had worked on Angel's. In very little time they were both naked as the day they were born, and Lindsey was burrowing into cold that felt like a furnace, hands and a mouth that left a trail of liquid fire everywhere they touched.

Lusting after Darla, living with Darla, treating Darla like precious porcelain for weeks, finally caught up with Lindsey. Angel wasn't fragile. Not in the least. Angel was solid and large and muscular and didn't mind a few bruises. From the moans he got when he bit into creamy skin, Angel really liked a few bruises. Liked to give them as well as get them.

Which was fine with Lindsey. He was in the mood for a little rough and ready. They were rough, and he was damned sure ready.

The first time he came, he heard the voices again. They were howling. They weren't happy. All but one. It sounded a little wistful, but it was laughing. Gradually, as large hands calmed him and roused him again, the laughter won out over the howls. As he came the second time, on his belly with Angel covering him, driving into him, driving him on, the voices faded away under the force of his own scream.

All of the voices but one, and that one whispered in the back of his brain as Angel curled over him, held him in place, howled into the side of his neck. Lindsey couldn't help but grin at the whisper.

"Wasn't quite what I meant about a pain in the arse, man, but if it works, go wit' it."

Lindsey was planning on it.

He wouldn't have pegged Angel for a snuggler, but after Angel'd pulled out, swiped at him with the corner of the sheet and collapsed beside him, those big hands reached out for him again. Dragged him around and arranged him comfortably atop a wall of cool muscle and soft skin. Lindsey had the strange impression that Angel was using him for a blanket. He rubbed his cheek against the shoulder beneath it and sighed. Angel shivered.

"You feelin' evil now?" He had to ask. Angel actually chuckled. Lindsey rode out the rumbles and waited for an answer.

"Nah. Just horny."

"You feel that way with Darla?" He knew he was pushing his luck, but it didn't bother him. He had to know. He'd always been one for details. There was a thoughtful silence before Angel answered him.

"No," he finally said quietly. "I didn't feel anything at all after having Darla."

Lindsey frowned. He didn't buy it, but he let it slide. Neither sledgehammers nor sex would get the direct truth from Angel if Angel didn't want to talk. So he attacked at an angle. "Is this an improvement?"

There was a hint of movement above him, as if Angel had ghosted a kiss across the top of his head. "I think so."

Neither one of them said anything for a long time. Lindsey was almost asleep when he found himself asking the really hard question. "What's next?"

"I don't know. Play it as it comes. Think that'd work?"

Drifting off, Lindsey couldn't stop his grin _or_ his drawl. "Hadn't so far, but I got high hopes." He was unconscious before Angel had the chance to come up with an answer. It was probably just as well.

When he awoke again it was early evening and he was alone in the bed. He wandered into the bathroom for a quick shower, then dressed in the clothes Angel had taken off him, finding his boots under the bed and putting them on. As he came down the stairs, Angel was waiting for him, keys in hand. Lindsey cocked his head and looked at him. Angel shrugged. Lindsey nodded. Might as well get it over with and see what happened next.

They were quiet on the way to Angel Investigations' office. Lindsey found himself enjoying the night air, as well as the little glances Angel kept shooting him. Weirdly enough, he didn't feel at all nervous. Something was going to happen, and it was supposed to happen, and he was going to go along for the ride and let it happen. Wasn't a damned thing he could do about it.

Given that he'd been a control freak for the past quarter century, his new laissez-faire attitude should probably scare the shit out of him. He curled his right hand against the edge of the window, and smiled into the wind. Then again, things had been far out of control for as long as he'd had the illusion he had them under control, so maybe now that he'd given _up_ control, he'd start to actually get himself some? The thought intrigued him, and he turned it over, examining it from all angles until they rolled to a stop outside the office. Angel took a deep breath and climbed out of the car. Lindsey hid his smile and followed. Unfortunately, Angel's momentum stalled out just inside the door.

"Hi," Angel said tentatively from the doorway. Lindsey ducked around him and leaned against the wall. Gunn stared narrow-eyed at both of them. Wesley cleared his throat.

"Are you out of your mind?" he asked, apparently involuntarily, then looked appalled with himself.

Lindsey barely managed to stop from grinning again, especially when Angel answered, "Probably."

"What do you want?" Cordelia challenged Lindsey directly. The corner of his mouth tipped up, and his wrist began to itch very lightly.

"A job." He made it sound as non-threatening as possible.

No one spoke for a moment, then Gunn, not taking his eyes off Lindsey, said in a cold voice, "Your call, English."

Wesley was shaking his head in the negative and Cordelia had her mouth open to back him up when her hands flew to her head and she yelped in pain. Angel moved so fast he was a blur, coming to a stop behind her and catching her as she lost control of her body, her muscles spasming under the force of the vision. Lindsey also moved without conscious thought, reaching out instinctively and catching her flailing hand in his.

His right hand.

The barbed-wire line around his wrist began to glow brightly, and he heard Wesley's choked off exclamation along with Gunn's muted "Holy shit!" Lindsey didn't pay much attention. He was too busy fighting to stay on his feet, swamped as he was by the torrent of pain that was flowing from Cordelia into him, cramping his muscles and overwhelming his mind. Calling on reserves of strength built in his hardscrabble childhood and reinforced as an adult, he gritted his teeth and rode the crest of the agony.

Cordelia sighed in relief and began to speak. Wesley moved and Lindsey was vaguely aware of scribbling sounds as he took notes. All he could see was Angel's face, staring back at him, anchoring him. All he could feel was the pain he was siphoning off the Seer.

Then fingers were unwrapping his clenched fist from around Cordelia's hand, and she was staring appraisingly at him with something that looked like approval in her dark eyes. She reached out and patted his cheek, and he rocked on his feet.

"He stays," Cordelia pronounced. "Better than Excedrin any day."

Angel reached around her, touching Lindsey's hand, and an arc of blue fire leapt from Lindsey to Angel. Cordelia inhaled sharply.

"When the Powers give a gift, it behooves one to accept," Wesley muttered, staring at Lindsey. "Regardless the form it may take."

"What the fuck?" Gunn asked him, still staring at Lindsey and Cordelia. Lindsey swallowed.

"About that Excedrin," he managed to ask, fighting down the last of the monster headache Cordelia's vision had given him, "got any handy?" Her smile as she handed him the pills and the water glass was a little too happy. He ignored it.

The crew went for their weapons, all but Angel, who stared around at the group and beamed. It was such a bizarre expression on his face they all stopped and stared back at him. Except Lindsey, who swallowed the pills, gulped the water, and glared at him.

For all of five seconds, before he caved in and returned the touch of his hand. That broke the spell on the rest of the gang, who hurried to grab their weapons and go out demon hunting. As they were piling into Angel's car, Lindsey leaned over and asked, "So is this the way it's gonna be?"

Angel shrugged one shoulder and darted a quick look his way. It wasn't quick enough. Lindsey saw the hope in it. In the back of his mind, a lilting brogue whispered back, "your choice, man. Last chance."

Lindsey shifted in the passenger seat, looked at the three people stuffed into the back seat, then glanced over at Angel staring at the road with more concentration than the traffic demanded. He rubbed his itching wrist against his chest. He'd been heading down this path all along, but he'd been too distracted to know it. He'd thought Darla would be it, but she'd just been a bend in the road.

A man only got so many choices. It would appear that he'd made his. He'd try not to blow it this time.

end

Epiphenomenon. **n**. 1. a phenomenon that occurs with and seems to result from another but has no reciprocal effect or subsequent influence.

 


End file.
